10 things to know for Tuesday, March 18: Putin approves draft bill for annexation of Crimea

Russia's President Vladimir Putin addresses the Federation Council in Moscow's Kremlin on Tuesday, March 18, 2014. President Vladimir Putin defended Russia’s move to annex Crimea, saying that the rights of ethnic Russians have been abused by the Ukrainian government. He pointed at the example of Kosovo’s independence bid supported by the West, and said that Crimea’s secession from Ukraine repeated Ukraine’s own secession from the Soviet Union in 1991. (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko)

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